Champagne Venom (Orlov Bratva, #1)(93)

It rises up no matter how many times Misha tries to beat it down.

I’m waiting in the greenhouse—as far from the main house and Misha as possible—when Cyrille and Ilya arrive hand in hand.

“Paige!” Cyrille greets.

She gives me a hug, but Ilya stays at her side. He’s armed with his backpack and a video game.

“It’s good to see you again, Ilya.” I gesture to his backpack. “Were you worried you’d get bored? I know the wedding planning yesterday wasn’t much fun.”

He glances at his mother. “I wasn’t bored.”

“Well, I sure was,” I give him a wink. “That video game you were playing looked really cool. I understand if you want to keep playing that. But I also heard you might like airplanes?”

He lights up, then quickly schools himself back to calm. “Yeah! I love them.”

“Your mom mentioned that you enjoyed puzzles, too. So I thought I’d take a chance and get you a little gift.” I reach behind the nearest shelf and pull out the long wooden box that I didn’t have time to wrap. It arrived only a half hour before Ilya and Cyrille.

“Whoa,” he breathes, his eyes widening with excitement as he reads the label. “It’s a model military plane!”

“Bingo. Maybe you can hang it in your room when you’re done building it.”

I pass it to him and he looks at the box in awe, holding it like he’s scared to smudge his fingerprints over the packaging. “Can I start now?”

“Have at it,” I encourage. “I cleared a space for you right over there just in case.”

He hurries to his little corner to get started, a smile on his face.

Cyrille looks after her son for a moment then turns to me with grateful eyes. “That was sweet of you.”

“It was my pleasure. I wanted to make sure he had a little fun at least.”

She sits down in the chair beside me and sighs. “Sometimes, I think he forgets that he’s allowed to have fun. I know it’s been months now, but it still feels like it was yesterday.”

It’s the first time she’s referenced Maksim’s death. Truth be told, it’s the first time she’s talked openly to me at all. Nessa and Nikita dominated the conversation yesterday, which is why I invited Cyrille today. I want to get to know her, too. If only because knowing another woman who willingly married into this family might be helpful.

“I lost my best friend when I was seventeen,” I admit. “It’s been over a decade and I still feel that way.”

“Ah, so it doesn’t get easier.”

“It does,” I say gently. “In its own kind of way. But you’ll never stop missing him.”

“Nor would I want to.”

Already, I can feel a kindred spirit in Cyrille. Maybe she feels the same way, because she immediately sheds the formalities, reaching over to touch the back of my hand where it rests in my lap. I don’t feel like “the don’s wife” with her. I just feel like me.

I wonder if she knows what a blessing that is.

“Are you okay, Paige?” she murmurs. “I know that entering this family can be overwhelming. I’m sure your introduction—or lack thereof—didn’t make it any easier.”

“I wish Misha had just introduced me to everyone properly before we got married.”

“Misha…” Cyrille sighs as though that’s explanation enough.

“What was he like?” I ask. “Before—”

Before Maksim died.

Before I knew him.

She gives me that sad smile of hers again. “He smiled a little bit more often. Laughed a little bit more freely. He spent all his time with the family. He would go camping a few times a year with Maksim, Konstantin, and Ilya. Just the boys, the four of them, out in the woods. Ilya loved it.”

“It must have been hard for Ilya,” I say softly. “Losing Maksim and Misha both in different ways.”

“It really does feel like we lost more than just Maksim that day.”

I meet her eyes, and I recognize something there that I feel in my core. “I want to help him. I just… I don’t know how.”

She strokes my hand tenderly. “Misha won’t make it easy for you to love him, Paige. But don’t stop trying. I think loving him might be the only way to help him.”

I flinch at the suggestion. “I’m not sure love is what’s going to work, Cyrille. Misha doesn’t believe in it. He has rules against that kind of thing.”

She rolls her eyes, her voice descending into bitterness. “The Orlov boys and their fucking rules.

Maksim had them when we got married, too.”

“How did you deal with them?”

Her eyes flash with a mischievous little glint. “I made him fall in love with me.”

“Well, like I said, I’m not sure Misha is the falling-in-love type.”

Cyrille looks me square in the face. “Do you really believe that, Paige?”

No.

Yes.

Maybe.

I don’t know.

I sigh deeply. “I have to believe it. My heart can’t handle hoping for something different and being let down.”

Cyrille reaches out and puts her hand on my arm. “Trust me, Paige: your heart is stronger than you think. If I’ve learned anything in my thirty-four years, it’s that you never regret loving people. You only regret not loving them enough.”